Round Barrow(s)

Fieldnotes

The parish church for the parish of Loggerheads (The church of St. John the Baptist) is not located in Loggerheads itself but in the village of Ashley to the East.

The Auctioneers Mound is an earthen mound scheduled as a round barrow situated in the field adjoining the church. The site is easy to find as it is located immediaetly to the rear of the house to the North of the church (directly opposite the village pub). On the far side of that house a track leads a very short distance down to a field gate, on the right-hand side of which is a stile labelled "Path to Podmore and Maer". Climb over the stile and the barrow is on your right in the next field on the other side of the barbed-wire fence.

The earthen mound is 1.8m high and 20m in diameter and has a flattened top 9m in diameter. An infilled ditch approx. 3m wide surrounds the barrow. In 1958 it was noted that an annual church service was held on the mound on Plough Sunday - but this tradition had apparently ceased by 1974. Presumably the name of the site comes from the idea of the Auctioneer standing atop the mound while conducting a sale of livestock giving them a panoramic view of both the stock and the bidders below.

The Auctioneers Mound is not shown on OS Landranger map 127. On OS Explorer map 243 the site is marked by an earthwork symbol and the label 'Mound' in plain text. The mound is not known to have been excavated and it has been suggested that it could be a Bronze Age Bowl Barrow, the motte of a timber castle or a burial mound covering medieval plague victims. It's location next to the church would not be unusual for any of these explanations.